Recommended Related to Men

The prevalence of obesity among American men has doubled in only 25 years,
and it’s killing us. A 2004 survey published in the Journal of the American
Medical Association found that 71% of men 20 years old and over were
overweight and 31% were obese. The same survey conducted in the late 1970s had
found 47% of men were overweight and 15% were obese.
Science is searching for the causes of obesity and exploring the role of
genes, the diets of pregnant women, and the feeding habits of babies....

"Fathers often will ask it about their sons -- and, while in the office, will ask about themselves," Palmer tells WebMD.

Men worried about their penis size usually have some other excuse for seeing a doctor, says Bruce R. Gilbert, MD, PhD, director of reproductive and sexual medicine at the Smith Institute for Urology in Lake Success, N.Y.

"When they come in for something else, they ask, 'Oh, by the way, I am concerned about the length of my penis,'" Gilbert tells WebMD. "Most are men in the 20-to-40 age group. But some are aged 40 to 50, and some even older men ask."

The vast majority of these men are in for a surprise. Worry about small penis size is common. Abnormally small penis size is not.

Penis Size: What's Normal, What's Not

You might think that as long a man's penis works, he would have no problem with it. You would be wrong.

Penis size is a key element of a man's self-image. Yet when he's not boasting to other men, the average man significantly underestimates the relative size of his penis.

Here's an example: Over a two-year period, 67 men asked an Italian hospital for surgical correction of a small penis. All turned out to have normal-size penises.

"A few days ago, I had a patient who spent an hour taking measurements of his penis and thinking it is too small," Gilbert says. "Yet it was normal."

That man isn't alone. About 45% of his brethren want a bigger penis. Never mind that 85% of heterosexual women say they are satisfied with their partners' penis parameters.

Many men worry about the size of their erections. Many more worry about how their penis looks when it's limp, studies find.

So how can a man know if he's normal, super-sized, or small? Not by his shoe size, a common and disproved myth about estimating penis length. Like so much else in life, direct measurement is the key.